Chapter 4

Chapter 4

I only truly began to see Song Yunshu during our third year of marriage.

That year, floods ravaged the south, and the Imperial Harem’s budget was stretched thin. To make matters worse, the Empress Dowager insisted on a grand celebration for the Longevity Festival, leading to heated arguments between the Ministry of Rites and the Ministry of Revenue at court. Worn down by the endless piles of memorials, I went to Qiwu Palace that night, hoping for nothing more than a moment of peace. Instead, I found Song Yunshu sitting under the lamp, meticulously revising the ledgers for the Six Palaces.

She had broken down the procurement, disaster relief, and ceremonial gifts, cutting unnecessary expenses and quietly funneling her own dowry into the gaps left in the Imperial Medical Bureau and the disaster grain funds.

“You are using your own dowry to supplement the national treasury?” I asked her.

She didn’t even look up. “The treasury is the treasury, and the harem is the harem. If the harem falls into chaos, the court will never find peace.”

I frowned. “You didn’t have to go this far.”

Only then did she raise her eyes to meet mine, her gaze calm and unruffled. “Did Your Majesty not appoint me as Empress precisely so that I would go this far?”

I was momentarily speechless.

She was always like this-possessing a perfect sense of propriety, yet always able to pick out the things I was least willing to admit with a single sentence.

During the autumn hunt that year, I was struck by a stray arrow in the enclosure. The wound wasn’t deep, but it was on my shoulder and back, making the imperial physicians hesitant and clumsy. When Song Yunshu changed my dressing, her movements were incredibly steady. I winced in pain as the medicinal powder touched the wound, but she acted as if she hadn’t seen, saying only in a cool voice, “If Your Majesty wishes to live a little longer, do not charge so far ahead next time.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “Are you actually lecturing me?”

“This consort is merely fulfilling the duties of an Empress.”

Duties again.

Over the years, those were the two words I heard most often from her lips.

But that night, after she finished tying the bandages and turned to leave, I suddenly reached out and grabbed her wrist.

She stopped and looked back at me.

Outside the hall, the autumn rain pattered softly. The tips of her hair were slightly damp, and her features looked exceptionally soft in the candlelight. For the first time, I realized that her hands were actually quite slender and cold, completely different from the image of a general’s daughter who I imagined would be comfortable with blades and spears.

I asked, “Song Yunshu, is there nothing you want to ask me?”

She thought for a moment and said, “If I ask, will Your Majesty answer?”

I remained silent.

She gently withdrew her hand and lowered her head in a polite bow. “Then this consort shall not ask.”

I watched her figure disappear behind the screen, feeling a strange sense of irritability in my heart.

I knew that what she wanted to ask wasn’t about state affairs or the harem. She likely wanted to ask why I kept her trapped in this palace, knowing full well that I could never give her what she truly wanted.

It was just that back then, I never felt that I owed her anything.

I was the Emperor, and the Empress was supposed to uphold half of the world for me. The better she did, the more justified I felt.

And I did not know that being ‘justified’ can sometimes be more hurtful than being heartless.